Chicken Butt

Not a resolution

I've seen some links to lists of books with reviews that people have read in 2010. I have no idea everything I read in 2010, I could poke through my bookshevles, piles of unshelved books, my Kindle account, books I've passed on to my nephew after reading and probably catch them all. Oops, forgot about the pile of books in the boot of my MINI Cooper. So, I'm going to put a bit of effort into at least mentioning books I've read. I doubt most will be more than that.

  So far in 2011 I've read book three of the Hunger Games trilogy, Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins. I really liked this YA series. I advise not to start the first unless you have immeadiate access to the rest. They are a quick read and you won't want to stop after the first.

  I am now reading Dreadnought by Cherie Priest. I put off buying it in hardback, then accidentally bought two copies of the paperback in December (returned the second one). I'm having similar troubles putting this one down too. I thought it was a YA book too, but protagonist is a young civil war widow, so I'm not sure it really is. The story takes place in an alternative universe where the civil war has been fought for 20 years and is still going strong. Also, steampunk.

I recommend both of these books.

I'm dull but drama free

I finally replaced the shower head in my bathroom last night and what a difference! I had not realized how miserable my showers had gotten. The water pretty much dribbled out, straight down, with no pressure. I probably could have soaked it again in vinegar and water, but I splurged and bought a $9 replacement.

There is a wide price range in shower heads. Most that I normally would have picked are in the area of $35. There were options going up $100 and more. There was a $1.99 option too. The $9 head is sort of cheap feeling, but the looks are all about the same between $9 - $42. I went with the $9 with three settings and I'm quite happy.

I did splurge on the replacement toilet seat though. The seat on my elongated toilet in the hall bathroom cracked and it pinched my ass. I put duct tape on it, but I can only bear that for a week before it is too gross even for me. So there I ended up getting the most expensive option at Lowe's for $30. I really despise the cheap plastic seats on newer toilets. 

This more frugal me has been going pretty well, except when I step into Barnes and Noble. Even trying to be good and putting back stuff I still walked out with $137 of books and DVDs on Friday night. I picked up the latest hardcovers from Connie Willis, Robert B. Parker and Jim Butcher. Willis and Parker died this winter, so this may or may not be their final book. I would have gotten Butcher on my Kindle, but I busted the screen last week and haven't figured out what to do about that yet. It is still usable, only the right side is gone, but I'm feeling a bit trapped in a DRM dilemma.  Oh, and MI-5 Series 7 is out. BBC Television shows are never cheap.

Wow, that is usually the type of post I write and decide not to post because it's boring even to me, but I haven't posted anything in a while. So yeah, sorry about that.

More thoughts on writing versus Writer

I thought about my sporadic urge to be a writer quite a bit this weekend.

I also want to work on the production crew of a major movie some time. I want to do a job to get my names in the credits, like Assistant to the Assistant PA or set building. I’d love to see what it is really like to make a movie. But I'm not going to move to LA or Montreal and try to break into the movie business. I want Oprah to grant me a wish so I can take a six month sabbatical from my real life and be a movie production grunt for a while. I think I want to be a writer in the same way. "Poof!" I'm a writer, I'll just pound out this novella and wrap it all up nice and tidy in a few months, get published and then, "Poof!" back to real life. Which is ridiculous, of course it is. I’m not even sure the published part is really important. I’m always drawn to the NaNoWriMo event, and that isn’t about publishing, it is about finishing a novel. I know this, but I love reading so much, I want to participate in the whole scene, not just the audience role.

One thing that attracts me to writing is the process of critique and discussion of the craft. I get excited about writing workshops and stories about mentors. It makes me homesick for the good parts of being a painting major. Chatting with a teacher at the studios about broad concepts and specific techniques was lovely. Critiques were great if I had finished my piece and wasn’t ashamed of myself for extreme procrastination. It would be so cool to go back to that environment now, with better discipline and an appreciation for that freedom and opportunity.

That might be the key: nostalgia. I read a lot of blogs by writers about writing. I read a lot of craft blogs too, but haven’t found many artists’ blogs. Actually, I have a lot of artist blogs bookmarked, but isn’t much activity on them or they are badly written or boring to me. Maybe I’ve glommed onto writers because they are there, active, well-spoken and entertaining.

Knock wood

Halloween costumes are in progress. So far I’m on track (I think). Three weekends left before school parades and H day. My goal is to finish all costumes on time without pulling any all-nighters.
Status:

Pirate vest: In Progress - needs buttonholes and buttons
Pirate pants: In Progress - needs waist elastic stitched, leg elastic waiting for boot cover completion
Pirate boot covers: Not Started
Pirate shirt: Not Started – considering buying adult pattern instead of altering child pattern
Pirate head scarf: Not Started
Snowman costume: In Progress – Fleece pieces cut
Snowman hat: In Progress – needs new band w/ flower. needs glue touched up to black from sizing changes. Should fit now, smaller felt hat glued inside too large top hat.
Ballerina tutu: Not Started - materials purchased.
Ballerina top: Not Started – probably needs embellishments to shirt sis will buy/find
Dark Fairy skirt: Not Started, materials purchased, ruffler foot bought, test gathering in progress.
Dark Fairy top: Not Started
Dark Fairy wings: In progress – wings purchased, need modifying if there is time

Ugh, so now that I wrote it out I don’t feel as impressed with myself. Maybe I’ll work on the boot covers so I can finish the pants too. I’d feel better if I had anything completely finished. At least this year I’ve got patterns for everything. Which is less stressful, but not as exciting either. It is frustrating figuring out what sewing instructions and unclear diagrams mean.

The pink chiffon and satin for Sis’s ballerina tutu arrived today. It will take time to get together, but once I figure out proper adjustment for the ruffler foot to gather 3-to-1 it should go pretty smooth. I will install my first invisible zippers for the snowman suit and do not have a special invisible zipper presser foot. I found this tutorial for using the standard zipper foot to sew invisible zippers, so I should be okay. Until this week I didn’t even know there was a specific foot for invisible zippers.

A huge thank you goes to Karen, who bought the snowman pattern in Canada and shipped it to me here in Illinois. Burda Fashion doesn’t sell it in the USA. Burda also doesn’t include seam allowances in the patterns. Both these things are very strange.

Apropos nothing, I read People of the Book by Geraldine Brooks this weekend. It was very good. I wonder why I let it sit on my to-read shelf for so long. (Please do not point out the correlation of reading a novel in three days to my costume progress. I do not acknowledge the implied causation.)

Blimey!

Today I gave away a book I’ve had in my car trunk for months.* I originally bought that copy of Little Brother, by Cory Doctorow, to give to a cousin on Christmas Eve. Then Dad and I skipped the festivities in Madison due to bad driving weather. The lovely metal measuring cups intended for the grab bag exchange migrated quickly into my kitchen. The book languished unread on my shelves.

I eat lunch in restaurants most work days (okay, every work day). Since I read at lunch I end up having many bookish conversations with restaurant employees. A young manager at Olive Garden and I had several conversations about reading. He wants to start reading, but wasn’t sure where to start and never gets around to it. I recommended a few things based on some books he liked. That evening I decided I’d give him my extra copy of Little Brother. Today is the first time I’ve seen him since. He said he has been working nights. I hope he enjoys it. I’ve now given away three copies of that book. Or is it four? It’s one of the books I grab now for literacy drives where you donate books at the book store counter.

*I tried to write boot instead of trunk but I just couldn’t do it. I love my MINI Cooper, watch way too much British TV drama and sometimes call my condo a flat, but I cannot use boot instead of trunk. Not naturally anyway. There is some kink in my mind that goes wonky if I try.

Too many light mysteries?

“If this was fiction, someone would be dead tomorrow.” That was my thought as I walked home in the rain last night. I had to park on the street (not my garage or court) because they are sealing blacktop today. I heard an argument through a neighbor’s open windows. A man and a woman yelled abuse at each other. The drapes were open so I could see him standing and yelling at a woman across the room.

I’m surprised they still live there. Condo association gossip said they were being evicted by their bank in July. He was kicked off the condo board last year because he wasn’t paying the monthly fees. The guy is a prick and made a huge fuss in June about broken rules and parking sign verbiage.  The sign was changed. I keep meaning to post a picture of it. It is a solid reminder of why I stifle the occasional urge to get involved in the association.

I have to park on the street again tonight. Will I see him bundling a suspiciously heavy carpet into his trunk?

So, anyways...

I have a touch of crafter's block. I read skimmed the manual for my new serger the night I got it and it intimidated the excited right out of me. I sympathize with all those who never take that fucker out of the box. I hope that the "Inspirational" CDs help. Two factors have kept me from watching them:

1. They are CDs, not DVDs and are compatible with Windows 95 and higher. So I'll have to watch them on my work laptop. That last thing I want to do at home is hook up my work computer. I leave it in the car on weekdays and right by the front door all weekend.
2. Fear. If these CDs don't enlighten me I'm SOL. Sure there are all kinds of positive posts about how easy it is to thread with just a little effort in the beginning, but part of me thought I would different, that my brilliant mind would immediately grasp the mechanics and I wouldn't even need the videos. I am so full of crap.

So yep. Nothing was sewn at my home this weekend. I even felt guilty enough about it to avoid sewing two more pool towel hoodies I have materials for. I did let go of a bunch of books from my shelves and assorted piles around my home. I took two paper ream boxes of books to Goodwill on Friday after deleting them from my LibraryThing (LT) library. I can see why people have created different categories on LT for books they've read but do not possess.

Pre-Kindle it was really hard for me to delete entries on LT. It is one thing to decide I'll probably never read the book again and won't want to loan it out, but to delete a LT entry that tells the world "I own this book" is hard, especially when I've gone to the trouble of tagging it and rating it and sometimes even writing a review. The fact that most of the books I've deleted from LT have two stars or less and have tags like "lousy" has little to do with the difficulty of letting go.

I also read some paper books this weekend. I read two YA books on Friday I wasn't sure I should keep or not (kept one of them). And then I read three Robert B. Parker books from the Spenser series. The Spenser books are as easy going as the kid books but with more blood. I decided to read Small Vices, the one where Spenser almost dies after the Grey Man shoots him and Susan and Hawk secretly nurse him back to health in California before he comes back and solves the case. I thought I could just read that one. It's the twenty-third in the series I think. But no, I finished that one and went right for #1 (Godswolf Manuscript). I finished #2 (God Save the Child) at midnight last night. I had to read the second one because Spenser meets Susan in it. And I'll probably go on because Hawk hasn't appeared yet and I thought #2 was about Paul, but it wasn't that comes later.)

Alright, I just lost everyone who reads CB right there didn't I? But that illustrates something important to my collection I think. There are some books that I will read again and again and there are some books I cannot recall at all even though I know I read them. Sure my collection is less complete without The Hunchback of Notre Dame, but I will never read that book again. It was depressing and way too long. Sure I felt superior when Disney spun their story and happied up the ending, but I don't lose that knowledge without the paperback and I don't get points for being well-read. Plus, if do for some crazy-assed reason want to read Hogo's Hunchback again I can download it for free from multiple locations on the net and read it on my Kindle.

My collection will have less balance and no longer contain most the books I've bought since Jr High, but it is more personal and relevant this way. So far I haven't missed anything I've let go in the last couple years.

And the sun burns into your eyes

I bought a little painting of a lemon at a fine arts fair this weekend. It is a reverse painting on glass and a bit modern compared to rest of my kitchen paintings, but since is mounted on a black plaque it looks fine. Except that the colors are muddy. I didn’t notice it in the booth because all his work was in the same palate, but compared to the bright primary colors in most of the other works it looks drab. I almost bought an apple and pear too. I’m glad I didn’t. It would probably look okay on the wall over the piano if I can get over my OCD instinct that puts all the produce in one room.

I really should take down all my art and redistribute it better. There are a lot of things I should do in my condo. There are paint swatches taped to my walls for about four years now. And my head ran off into the billion big and little things I have not done at home. Gah!

I stayed up way too late last night (um, this morning) reading Killing Floor. It’s the first Jack Reacher book from Lee Child. It’s pretty good. It’s actually the second one I read. I downloaded Persuader, the eighth book in the series, for free and then bought the first and started reading without even a bathroom break. According to Child’s website there are thirteen Jack Reacher books at present. (And I Don’t Know is on third.) I finished the book at lunch today and just bought number three on Amazon. So when I turn on the wireless on my kindle I’ll have the book to start reading at dinner. The battery lasts so much longer without wireless on all the time. Not sure why I was so reluctant to turn it off before. It is only three clicks to toggle it on and off.

I've also decided if I even need to do a cover of a song or use a song to illustrate a movie it must be TheThe's That was the Day. Just so you know.

More Kindle McLoven

I went to Barnes & Noble to buy a gift certificate for my dad's birthday today. (He's now 73.) There were new hardcover books for two series I'm reading. Normally I would buy them both, but neither series is stellar. I pulled out my Kindle 2 and looked each of them up; both are available in ebook form. I bought them from the Kindle Store for 9.99 each. I felt a tad tacky doing it right at the shelf, but my bill at B&N was still over $100.* If the books had not been available as ebooks I would have purchased them today. I saved at least $30 and I won't have those two hardcovers sitting on my shelves gathering dust.

With my K2 I have seen the future and believed it as coming now, not at some fuzzy future date. Not only are my VHS tapes antiquated, but my DVDs are too. Not because of Bluray or some other hard copy format, but streaming media. I love my Netflix Roku, but it won't replace DVDs for me yet. The quality isn't as good, I have no say over widescreen or pan and scan formats, and there are no special features available, but I'm sure those will be available soon.

* B&N carries reading glasses that are available at +0.75 strength. I bought two pairs. This is very exciting, I couldn't even find any decent pairs online at that strength in ready-made form. One of the pairs is even sort of funky cool. Hooray!

New Toy: Kindle 2

I received my Kindle 2 last Thursday. I don’t love it yet. It’s a neat gadget and I think I will grow to like it a lot, but it is a big adjustment.

The text is clear. The default text size is working best. I’d like to go one smaller to reduce number of page turns, but I think I need a stronger prescription for my contacts, or I maybe it’s time for reading glasses.

I feel like I’m hurtling through the text and not taking it all in. I keep clicking the Next Page button too early. I miss the last couple lines and have to go back. I’m too aware of the medium to lose myself in the story. I’m reading an author I’ve never read before, so it could be the writing, but I think it is the Kindle. On Saturday I read for a while and got into the story. I think I just need to train myself that the ebook reader page turn cue comes later than the manual book page turn. It might take a while to override 30+ years of habit.

I decided I want to keep my K2 in a protective pouch along with a stand. There aren’t a lot of commercial options out there for the K2. I like the cases that open like a reporter notebook and can be used like an easel, but they are open on all but one side. Considering the flotsam in my purse I want more protection for this over-priced gadget. Some book shaped covers are enclosed with zippers, but the point is to get away from traditional book format. The best thing about reading with the K2 is eating in public without propping a book up at a good angle and having to hold the pages open. I use my planner to prop the book up and if I can, I wedge the edge of the book under the plate rim. This technique only works well in the middle pages of a book unless I wreck the spine.

I sewed a simple envelope of vinyl on Sunday. Velcro holds the flap closed. It will do for now, but I think more padding would be better. I looked on Etsy for a case, there are two sellers claiming to be the ORIGINAL. Their description text is almost identical except that one uses foam and the other quilted fleece. Their bitter sniping about each other’s products turned me off of both sellers.

Stands are more difficult. I’ve found two easels that are stable, but both are too wide and deep to be ideal. I spent some time in Home Depot yesterday looking for inspiration. I bought some acrylic sheets, some strap hinges and assorted epoxies and glues. I have a design in mind, but implementation might end up being less condensed than the plate stand I’m using in the interim. If only I had a 3D fabricator.